Sixty 5 acres on the coast of North Carolina have been bought by Mamie Reels Ellison’s great-grandfather within the aftermath of slavery. That land on Silver Greenback Highway grew to become a house, a spot to farm and fish, and a sanctuary, stretching from its pine and gum-tree woods to a sandy seaside, the place the Reels household relaxed for generations.
By the 2000s, although, the Reels homestead was in jeopardy. Builders had claimed the waterfront property, and Mamie’s two brothers, Melvin Davis and Licurtis Reels, misplaced eight years in jail for refusing to vacate their homes. Directed by Raoul Peck, “Silver Greenback Highway” adapts a 2019 ProPublica feature by Lizzie Presser into an intimate portrait of the household’s forbearance within the face of dispossession.
Mamie and her niece Kim Duhon lead the household’s effort to carry onto the land, however whereas dipping into the authorized morass, Peck’s movie is extra about sitting with the 2 ladies and their family, listening to out their fears and hopes as their ancestors’ land sits in limbo. Peck, who directed the fierce and engrossing James Baldwin documentary “I Am Not Your Negro,” refrains from systemic-style evaluation to let the household communicate for themselves about their expertise.
A birthday gathering for 95-year-old Gertrude Reels units the tone early on for the household’s tight-knit circles and sense of continuity. Interviews with Mamie and Kim evoke fond recollections of their childhood haven, illustrated with light images; and Melvin, a fisherman with a successful aptitude, offers us an on-the-ground sense of the land, roaming via woods and waterways. (Peck attracts on 90-odd hours of footage initially shot by Mayeta Clark for ProPublica.)
Their authorized bother dates again to the Nineteen Seventies when a Reels patriarch, suspicious of Southern courts, died with out leaving a will. His land was handed to his youngsters, however one of many co-owning family secretly bought the land to a developer via a authorized loophole. It’s just one maneuver amongst many which have been exploited in a vicious historical past of Black land dispossession, because the movie’s concise captions clarify: Over the course of the twentieth century, Black Individuals misplaced about 90 % of their farmland.
The movie’s second half shifts to the battle to free Melvin and Licurtis from a sentence whose substantial size feels racially motivated. However Peck doesn’t give the movie over to talking-head specialists explaining how the Reels are symptomatic victims. Their weariness and disappointment comes via in interviews with them, however they’re additionally palpably borne up by love and perception. (Animated intertwining branches within the movie’s illustrations evoke their household tree.)
Whereas videotaping outsiders on the Reels property throughout the brothers’ time in jail, Mamie minces zero phrases about racism amongst whites. However nobody right here is outlined by this wrestle, and amid the looming threats to a cherished house, Peck’s accomplishment is to let the Reels household personal their emotional area.
Silver Greenback Highway
Rated PG. Operating time: 1 hour 40 minutes. Watch on Amazon Prime Video.
